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7:30 PM EST: The Developer AMA is now over and we've categorized the responses. See below!
Hearthstone on Android Rolls Out
Australia, Canada, and New Zealand are getting it first! You can find it on Google Play.
Quote from BlizzardThe Hearthstone Android tablet rollout begins! As part of the first phase of our Android launch, players in Australia, Canada, and New Zealand can now download Hearthstone for free on Google Play—and in the coming days, we’ll be fully rolling out Hearthstone worldwide on the Amazon Appstore for Android and Google Play.
You’ll have the complete Hearthstone experience at your fingertips, so get ready to engage in the mech-fueled antics of Goblins vs Gnomes and explore the haunted halls of the Curse of Naxxramas adventure on your little-green-robot-powered Android tablet.
But wait, there’s more! As an added bonus for giving Hearthstone a go on your Android tablet, you’ll earn a free pack of Classic cards. All you need to do to redeem your free pack of cards is play a game of Hearthstone in any mode on your Android tablet, and BAM, you’ll be busting open a new pack in no time. Win or lose, you’ll earn your free card pack just by enjoying a game of Hearthstone in Play, Arena, or Practice mode.
As always, your card collection and progress will be shared across all devices used to access your Hearthstone account, so everything will be waiting for you when you launch Hearthstone from your Android tablet.
Worried that your tablet can’t run Hearthstone? Check out our support site article for the minimum requirements. And for those of you itching to sling cards from your phone, we’re still polishing all the necessary mana crystals and calibrating mechanics, but we’ll have more news for you early next year
Hearthstone Developer AMA Recap
The Developer AMA has concluded. We've recapped the important stuff right here, or you can check out our full transcript here. You can also view the AMA here.
Quote from BlizzardCards & Balance
- It's too early on in GvG to make any changes to cards right now. They're always watching though. (Zeriyah)
- Flame Leviathan was born when the team wanted to try out an on draw effect. (Yong Woo)
- Sabotage - Used to be 6 mana, Destroy an enemy minion and all copies of it in your opponent's hand and deck. (Ben Brode)
- They're considering changing Bane of Doom to include GvG demons, but it's something that they have to be careful with because it puts the demon directly into play instead of your hand. (Zeriyah)
Game Design
- Each class should feel distinct and full of flavor. Tribal themes (Shaman getting some Murlocs, Rogue getting Pirates) is a great way of doing this. (Yong Woo)
- Different teams are working on different stages of an expansion. When effects and engineering wraps up, the design team is already concepting out the next set of content. (Yong Woo)
- Rotating card sets as more content is released is something that can be addressed at a later date. The team feels they're still far away from doing it though. (Yong Woo)
- They're still discussing the frequency of content releases. (Ben Brode)
- When choosing art for a new card, first they look through all the WoW art they have access to, and if they don't find something perfect, then the art team will make something brand new based on specs from the designers. (Yong Woo)
- They are aware of the feedback surrounding the second player's hand in spectator mode being upside down. No changes cited. (Zeriyah)
- They would like to improve the Casual Mode experience. The new player experience is very important to them. (Zeriyah)
- Can't be targeted by Spells or Hero Powers may receive a keyword one day, but not yet. "Untargetable" and "Ethereal" have been discussed as possible replacements. (Ben Brode)
- Hearthstone will be compatible with all payment methods supported by Google Play. (Yong Woo)
Bugs
- Brand new players shouldn't be matched up against players with massive collections, but some issues have been found and are being worked on. (Ben Brode)
- The delay on secret activation is a bug and will be fixed in an upcoming patch. (Ben Brode)
Community Requests
Nothing below has been officially confirmed for release.
- More Deck Slots: They have "cool ideas" on how they can give power-users more deck slots. "I think we can make magic happen somehow". (Ben Brode)
- Tournament Mode: They're looking into new ways that players could get together and compete with each other, but ideas are still in the early stage. (Yong Woo)
- Quests: They would like to add more daily quests to the game. (Yong Woo)
- Replays: They are not currently working on a replay feature. (Yong Woo)
- More Gold: o plans to add more ways to obtain gold at this time. (Ben Brode)
- Ben agrees that something that merged your golden and normal cards into the same card stack would be cool. (Ben Brode) [Example]
- Displaying a total of how complete your collection is has been something they've wanted to add for a while. (Ben Brode)
- If cosmetic unlockables are something that the Hearthstone community would be really excited about, it's something we can look into! (Yong Woo)
- "Seems like a cool idea" - Ben Brode on new fun game modes. (Ben Brode)
- New classes are hard to figure out. It would be "friggin' rad", but you'd be less likely to get class specific cards you want, and balance gets trickier. (Ben Brode)
- No immediate plans for 2v2 mode. It is discussed over lunch at times though. (Yong Woo)
- They'll discuss doing a sound panel during BlizzCon. The sound team would love it. (Yong Woo)
- Being able to use your golden cards and portraits in the arena is something the team is excited to do when they find the time. (Yong Woo)
Dev AMA Transcript
We've transcribed the entire AMA over on the forums!
Nice!
Trying not to be a downer, but what's with all the nonsense in the reddit thread? "Make some magic happen" regarding adding more deck slots? "Find some time" to add golden cards to arena? These are extremely easy to do and I could code this in less than an hour. Making the additional deck slots look pretty may take more time but come on.
Awesome! I would love to see a golden card implementation in arena. I have so many golden cards I would never run in constructed that I'd pick any day in arena! Good to hear that is something they want to do in the future.
Would be good to see some themed events and associated daily challenges:
Would potentially break up the meta a bit as well getting some underplayed cards out there.
I hope if they do this they make them 60 gold because they sound more annoying than the existing quests lol
I don't understand the resistance to adding more deck slots and I don't think we should have to earn it in any way. Seriously, give me 50 and I'll shut up about it.
Sadly a rarity in our modern world: Game Devs willing to wait and see before they intervene.
Running it already on Nexus 7(2013) from Czech Republik, got a free pack, game loads fast but still have random crashes here and there
Go away fan boy,go visit steve jobs!
I fear the day the phone version gets released, and the last of my productivity dies.
you can play already on a phone with root, u still have to have a great display tho
Gah! I'm so excited for all the things that they mentioned 'might' be happening - more daily quests is something I've wanted for a long time.
Looks like they really like to take their time before doing something… which is great.
Interesting response to the requests, hopefully there would be concrete action.
Hopefully the next project is to get Hearthstone working for the Windows App store for users on Windows RT Devices.
Aussie Android player here. Didn't get a free pack after playing a game.
Let's not be ridiculous. It's just a bug. It will get fixed.
If only it were that easy. It's a lot of work to develop the game for the platforms and I appreciate that the HS team does its best to deliver a (near) perfect app. So far the only bug I've found is that the pack isn't awarded, other than that it works perfectly. Let's not rag on them too much (although of course I'd've loved for the Android version to have been available sooner but it's here now, at least).
Blizzard has much experience with Apple OS, as they are also developing for MAC. This is why it was easier for them to develop an IPad version, as they could use their "Apple Frameworks" or whatever.
I think "ethereal" is better, since they can be targeted by battlecries.